Speaker Mary Popple - Malawi Ploughs Project

President Ewen Allan was in the chair at the Club's meeting in the Best Western Scores Hotel. At this time of the year the President nominates the Rotarian of the Year and this year the award was given to Deirdre Mansbridge for all the work she has done in many aspects of the Club's activities. The speaker for the evening was Mary Popple one of whose many interests is the Just Trading Scotland (JTS) organisation of which she is a Director. The organisation's aim is to improve agricultural practices in Malawi with particular reference to the Kilombero Rice Project growing high quality rice. With financial help from the Scottish Government micro financing was provided for subsistence farmers to increase production thus increasing income. The country is in the lowest 10 of world GDPs. The project began by supplying better quality seed eventually to 7000 farmers. Once the rice had been harvested improved methods of preparation were introduced to improve the product quality. Japanese methods were introduced and the simple method of drying rice on ground sheets meant there was less contamination from the ground. The next move was to buy carts to transport the rice to the mills. Originally 56 were bought but the farmers have managed to increase this to over 100. A sales market was very important and this is now being created in Scotland and Europe, locally through the Fair Trading organisation. To improve planting, ploughs were then provided which speeded up the process and again with increased income the farmers were able to buy more. Unfortunately the Scottish Government grant has now stopped, with serious drought conditions prevailing in other areas of east Africa the money has been diverted elsewhere. To help the farmers, JTS pays  for their crop before delivery which means there can be a serious gap in the organisation's cash flow before the product is delivered and sold creating a strain on resources. After a most interesting and informative talk, Ranald Barrie expressed the Club's thanks.